Vertical

This is one of the primary offences we will be looking to run throughout the cycle. Having a good understanding of it before training 1 will help us make better use of our time together

Overview

The vertical offence is loosely based off of the offensive structure used by US open club Truck Stop. This video gives you a high level introduction to the basic principles.

The focus of this offence is to minimise the number of times the disc is turned over. This is achieved using the following general principles:

Resetting the disc frequently and effectively.
Effectively attacking the breakside.
Minimising the number of contested/difficult hucks that are thrown.

The offence is built around initiating flow through handler movement and then capitalising on the movement to progress downfield through continuation cuts.

Core Concept

For the purpose of this offence imagine the pitch is divided into the central ½ and two outer ¼ ‘s lengthways down the pitch.
The playbook will also refer to the “gainline”. This is a horizontal line from the current position of the player with the disc. Throwing over the “gainline” represents moving the disc closer to the opposition’s endzone

Basic Structure

2 Handlers in the backfield. When the disc is in the middle of the pitch the dump should set up on the open side behind the gain line. If the disc is on the sideline the dump should start level with disc.
5 Cutters in a vertical stack with the front of stack isolated in space.

This point provides a good example of how the offence should work

Front of Stack Isolation

This playbook will not go into the details of specific shapes of cut to make from the front of stack isolation, as it is dependent on a number of factors. However, general principles are:

We are looking to aggressively attack the breakside
We want to punish defenders when they over commit to trying to stop the breakside option and take advantage of defenders who sit off too far onto the openside.
We want to try to avoid moving too far back towards the handler space

Movement From Stationary

Central ½

When the disc is in the central ½ we want the first cut to come from the player isolated at the front of the stack. This is cutter initiated and should be run like a front of stack isolation cut in an endzone set.

Outer ¼

When the disc is in the outer ¼ of the pitch we want to look to reset the disc immediately. The player on the disc should turn to the dump to initiate, the dump then runs a reset cut.
If they do not get free they clear up the line and the front of stack fills in.

General principles on dump cutting

Where possible we are looking to reset the disc into a strong position avoiding passive dump cuts where you end up behind the initial thrower.
Don’t be afraid to clear up the line aggressively straight away, allowing the front of stack to fill in.

Movement in Flow

For this section the offence will be broken into two parts:

Continuation after the disc moves horizontally (i.e. behind or in line with the gainline)
Continuation after the disc moves upfield towards the oppositions endzone (ahead of the gainline)

1. Continuation after the disc moves horizontally

Scenario 1 – The disc swings from either the breakside or openside outer ¼ into the centre of the pitch.

In this scenario the continuation should come from the back of the stack.
If the back of stack cut gets looked off then the front iso is initiated
If neither gets free we reset the disc

Scenario 2 – The disc swings from the centre of the pitch into the openside outer ¼

Where possible we want the handler who swung the disc to throw and go to receive the disc up the line
If this is not possible due to offensive/defensive positioning then we want to initiate the front of stack
If neither is free we reset

Scenario 3 – The disc swings from the centre of the pitch into the breakside outer ¼

Imediately look to hit the front of stack ISO
Otherwise reset the disc

2. Continuation after the disc moves upfield

Whenever the disc moves upfield we want the continuation to come from the back of the stack. The continuation can be an under or deep cut. However, we want to be selective with the deep options we take on. [See note on Hucking]
If the back of stack continuation is marked out we want to look to reset early.

3. Clearing from the handler space

After the disc moves upfield

There will be three offensive players in the handler space (the dump, the thrower, and the receiver). In this scenario, the player furthest away from the disc should clear wide upfield. They should then fill into the middle of the stack. If we get continuous upfield flow and as a result, there is no front of stack they should fill into the front.

After the dump clears up the line

If the dump has to clear up the line from a reset they should fill into the middle of the stack.

A NOTE ON HUCKING

A large proportion of turnovers in elite ultimate come from when players huck the disc. We want to minimise these turnovers by taking on deep shot that have a high completion rate. These ‘good’ deep shots can arise naturally from flow or be artificially generated by a pull play.

This section will discuss some general principles for what is a ‘good’ deep shot.

Good deep shots

The cutter has separation from their defender
The cutter is isolated in a one-on-one in space, this is particularly important for mixed ultimate
The deep cut starts from a position that is significantly shallower than the comfortable range of the thrower
The deep throw finishes in a different ⅓ to where it was thrown from

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